Stun

Rules are on page 48.  Let's talk about stun for a moment.

Question 1:  Is Stun over-powered?  

I've seen this argument.  But, I don't think so--not at all.  There's a major difference between Stun damage and normal damage.  With Stun damage, a hit can be ignored.  If you roll a normal "Stun" effect when using the Stun attack type, rolling STR higher than the damage will allow you to ignore the stun damage completely.  That's a huge benefit.

What are your thoughts?

Question 2:  How does Stun work?

We know how blasters work.  Tibanna gas is heated to a plasma state and magnetically fired out the barrel of the weapon.  The plasma bolt is contained in an elongated magnetic bubble.  When it hits, it hits with force and kinetic energy plus heat from the super-heated plasma.

Stun has to be some other process entirely.  From what we have seen in A New Hope, when Leia got struck, and the scene with Poe Dameron in The Last Jedi, the stun effect is some sort of beam that fires out of the weapon in a cone shape.  It looks to be shorter range than typical blaster bolts, but the game says the ranges remain the same for either ammo type.

Plus, the stun doesn't use tibanna gas.  There's no plasma.  From the movies, I'd guess that the stun is some sort of energy field (inside the cone) the screws with the body's nervous system.

This damage type seems to be a function of the blaster's power source only.  Ammo for a blaster is two-fold.  There's the battery pack, and there's the tibanna gas.  Stun seems to use up battery energy.  I would think that the weapon would use up battery power quicker than standard blaster bolts, but the game says combat stats remain the same except for the stun damage results.